What are dogmas?

1 • Five-dimensional geometry!

(DISCLAIMER: in this first section, I might sound like I’m speaking Klingon… but I promise I’ll get back on track from the second one on! I swear on Nantosuelta! 🥸)

In engineering school, there’s a class called “linear algebra,” and it’s seriously awesome…

…now, without boring you with a whole lecture… in super-duper simple terms, linear algebra teaches you how to do calculations in multidimensional systems (for the experts out there, I’m talking about Euclidean spaces).

In other words, it teaches you to break free from the “constraints” of three dimensions and do calculations in four-dimensional, five-dimensional, ten-dimensional… n-dimensional spaces!

What’s so special about “thinking in n dimensions” instead of three?

If I think of two points in three-dimensional space, I can close my eyes and “picture the scene” in my head:

I’ve got the concepts of “point,” “segment,” and “distance”… I can do the math and picture the whole thing.

Good.

In n dimensions, I’ve got the same concepts (there are precise mathematical definitions for a point, a line, or a segment in four, five, etc. dimensions)…

…but I can’t picture an n-dimensional space!

We live in a three-dimensional reality… and unfortunately, we can only conceive of things in three dimensions.

Algebraically speaking, we can do calculations in systems with more than three dimensions… but to picture them in our minds, we have no choice but to resort to analogies, that is, to use things-we-know to represent things-we-don’t-know.

…

Alright…

…end of the nerdy math/geometry mental gymnastics…

…if you’ve followed me this far, the same goes for any reasoning about God:

• What does it mean that God is “Someone, not something“?
• What does it mean that God is “one and triune” (or, as the eggheads put it, “one substance and three persons“)?
• What does it mean that “in the beginning was the Logos, and the Logos was in relationship with (πρὸς + accusative) God, and the Logos was God” (John 1:1)?

(Just like with multidimensional systems,) even when we talk about stuff-that-has-to-do-with-God (that is, stuff we can’t fully see/touch/understand), if we want our reasoning to make sense, we have to use the same tools:

• analogies;
• similes;
• correspondences between concepts;
• etc.

2 • What is the relationship between “language” and “reality”?

The million-dollar question:

I don’t think so (as I tried to explain a few years ago).

In my life, I’ve run into painful moments, happy moments, losses, memories, desires, anxieties, etc… moments when it was impossible to fully put into words what I had inside…

To paraphrase a line from A Silvia (a famous poem by Giacomo Leopardi, one of the greatest poets in Italian literature):

I think Giacomo Leopardi (1798-1837) captured really well, in his poems, how spoken language can’t grasp the whole of reality…

When it comes to restlessness/angst/anxiety, Leopardi and I have always been neck and neck, right down to the photo finish…

Aaanyway, let’s not get sidetracked…

Along with Leopardi, Lovecraft, and other writers, I’ve always thought that:

• words have limits;
• reality is bigger than my noggin.

~

A lot of people believe that technical-scientific language is the best tool we have to describe reality…

…and that analogies/symbols/metaphors are a “second-rate language.”

I don’t think the issue can be dismissed that easily.

Oh, don’t get me wrong: technical-scientific language is precise, clear, systematic, meticulous, you-name-it…

…but it has its limits!

When scientific language can’t de-fine (i.e., “set the boundaries of“) a reality, there are other forms of language that let us talk (with due caution) about what surpasses our intellect.

In other words, analogies are often the best tool we have for talking about something that’s beyond what we’re capable of knowing.

3 • What are dogmas?

To a lot of people, the word “dogma” sounds kind of “dictatorial.”

Something that “falls from the sky.”

A statement that leaves no room for argument.

…

…but actually, a dogma is the exact opposite: the word simply means that the Church has become aware of something it had already been guarding/living/breathing for centuries.

Basically:

Every time the Church has opened its mouth on theological questions throughout history, it has always followed this order:

• starting from concrete life, that is, from what Christian communities have experienced day by day, over the centuries, in relation to themselves, God, the sacraments, creation, grace, etc…
• …and then, by “connecting the dots,” dogmas were defined.

Which, if you think about it, isn’t all that different from the scientific method:

• first comes the data collection (empirical research);
• then comes the systematic/conceptual formulation of what has been lived in practice.

(Cf. MICHELINA TENACE, Cristiani si diventa: Dogma e vita nei primi tre concili, Lipa, Rome 2013, p. 18)

4 • Dogmas aren’t “quartz crystals” but “mines” to dig into

Another very common (and very wrong) idea about dogmas is that they’re “static.”

Dogmas are often seen as “monoliths”… “quartz crystals” to contemplate in silence.

I think these images are completely wrong.

If we really had to use an analogy to describe dogmas, I’d say they’re more like mines to dig into.

Or, as Sergej Bulgakov (1871-1944), a Russian Orthodox philosopher, theologian, and priest, wrote, dogmas are maps to explore:

And once again, if people think of dogmas as something “static” or as “truths dropped from the sky,” the blame lies with certain priests…

To quote Bulgakov again:

Joseph Ratzinger, on the other hand, was even more blunt:

…

Oh.

Obviously, everything I’ve said so far about dogmas is no excuse to slide into relativism.

Saying that a dogma is “something to dig deeper into” doesn’t contradict the truth it expresses.

The Church’s certainty about dogmas is crystal clear, stable, firm.

As Marko Ivan Rupnik put it, dogmas are, and continue to be:

However, dogmas should never be seen as “a finish line“; they are (and always will be) a starting point for going deeper in our knowledge of God (and in our relationship with God).

Conclusion

The Church often gets accused of being “the dogmatic one“…

…but in reality, from AD 33 to today, it has proclaimed very few dogmas.

You can count them on the fingers of both hands (or just a few more).

Doing some quick math in my head, I don’t think contemporary culture is any less dogmatic… quite the opposite:

So, yeah…

Over and out…

salt

(Winter 2021-2022)